Opportunities abound for traveling to a southern clime without ever leaving metropolitan Providence. Whether supping at a Columbian restaurant, lunching at a Dominican ladle house, nibbling pastries from a Guatemalan bakery, or picking up fresh-made tamales at a Spanish market, you can almost smell the bougainvillea and feel the sun on your face. Never is this more true than at Tina's Caribbean.

Sure, there are posters of Jamaican beaches along one side of this diner-like eatery to set you to dreaming. But the aromas from Tina's tiny kitchen are as alluring as the sweetest flowers, and her smile is as warm as any island breeze. And if there are menu items that she can't quite explain, there are plenty of regulars close at hand who can.

Take cocoa bread, for example. It's a wonderful, soft white bread, folded over on itself, with no hint of chocolate, particularly nice wrapped around a piece of Tina's jerk chicken ($4.28). A nearby customer and his friend, a long-distance truck driver, both Jamaican-Americans, explained the mystery of the "cocoa" in the bread. In this case, "cocoa" is another term for cassava, the starchy tuber that's a staple in the Caribbean.

After we sampled some warm cocoa bread, Bill ordered a plate of curried chicken ($6.42), and I got red snapper ($7.49). The curry was flavorful though not at all fiery. The fried whole snapper was a bit tricky to eat, but quite wonderful, especially with the accompanying sauteed onions and peppers. Both of our platters came with the best fried plantains we've had in years (more about this later), tasty callalou (Caribbean greens simmered with onions and tomatoes), and a heap of Jamaica's national dish: rice and peas. The rice was simmered in coconut milk, with a bit of onion, before being tossed with red kidney beans. But what about the "peas?"

Our new friends, who had been carrying on animated conversations in a lilting island patois with other regulars, again came to our aid. Kidney beans are often substituted in the states for a small red bean (or pea) in Jamaica. From my Southern heritage, I know that many of what Northerners would call beans are called peas south of the Mason-Dixon -- cream peas, crowder peas and, the only survivors in Yankee culture, black-eyed peas. Whatever you call it, this rice/peas dish was delish.

Bill also loved the Jamaican beef patty he had as an appetizer ($1.39). With a flaky crust yellow with curry and a spicy chopped filling, the patty reduced him to grins and murmurs of "mmmmm." Chicken and vegetable patties were also available that evening. The ginger beer ($2.50) and the beet juice milkshake ($2.50) were welcome additions to our meal. But for the truly exotic, try the deep red sorrel punch, a sweet fruit drink with a wild tanginess from the hibiscus flowers ("sorrel" to Jamaicans) that form its base.

For dessert, we each had spice cake, dense with raisins and flavored with rum, and Tina (actually Retina Dankley Rowe) gave us each a scoop of rum raisin ice cream on the side -- two ways to serve a bit of the island's national drink without a liquor license.

Our take-out from Tina's (in addition to leftover rice and peas) was a platter of jerk chicken ($6.42) and a bit of a breakfast favorite, the Bob Marley special ($6.42). The chicken was nicely roasted and mouth-warming good. The Marley, which scrambles cut-up ackee (a yellow Caribbean fruit) with soaked salt cod, onions, peppers, and rice, had Bill and me doing our best Belafonte imitations in the kitchen. ("Ackee, rice, salt fish are nice, and the rum is fine any time of year!)

But the best piece of Jamaican culture came from Tina herself. Asked by Bill what she'd done to make the plantains so special, she replied, "I fry them a bit, then I pound them to bring up the flavor, then I fry them again." "But what about that wonderful tang?" Bill persisted. "Ah, that," she said. "That's the blessin' in them!"

To take a real trip to Jamaica, drop by Tina's before February 28 and purchase a raffle ticket. First prize is roundtrip airfare for two, plus four days and three nights at a Montego Bay resort.

Issue Date: February 22 - 28, 2002